Warriors' veteran presence too much for a Rockets team that's just getting started

HOUSTON — You get the feeling the Golden State Warriors relish any chance to rub their opponents’ noses in their success, that it parallels the pursuit of winning — the ability to quiet an arena, to send fans wearing red shirts home, red with anger and frustration.

Yes, again, Houston, the Warriors are forever your problem.

Perhaps the Warriors should claim the Rudy Tomjanovich phrase he coined in 1995 after the Rockets completed their improbable championship run to back-to-back titles.

“Never underestimate the heart of a champion.”

After all, the Warriors have taken everything else that seemingly belonged to this franchise through the years. Golden State delivered another jolt of disappointment in Game 7 of their first-round series Sunday night with a 103-89 win at Toyota Center.

These Warriors are different than championship vintage, tand hey didn’t feel like favorites on the road, especially after losing two straight games in unremarkable fashion. There are too many unproven players, too many wild cards coach Steve Kerr can’t fully rely on night to night. And it’s even more difficult now for Stephen Curry and Draymond Green to dominate a game on call.

But if you put accountability on one side and concentration on the other, they can combine those two elements to grind out wins and advance to the second round for the second time in three years.

When it was all said and done Sunday, it was Stephen Curry, Draymond Green and the Warriors once again moving on. (AP Photo/Ashley Landis)

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Green was admittedly at fault for Game 6’s underwhelming performance at home, when the Warriors could’ve closed out this series and got a couple days’ rest before heading to Minneapolis.

But talks with his wife, friends and college coaches and listening to some old-school ’90s R&B got his mind together after losing his poise Friday, when he knocked Jalen Green in the head, four minutes into the game.

“I spent the last two days embarrassed at what I gave to the game, gave to the world,” Draymond Green said. “I’ve been dying since the last game, needed to get out on the floor, prove who I am. One thing about this league, you’re never done proving who you are until you’re done, completely finished.”

Green had to keep Alperen Şengün and Steven Adams off the glass, but more importantly he had to keep his word from the night before when he addressed his teammates at a team dinner, shouldering the blame for there even being a Game 7 to begin with.

“They wanted me to speak and I had a lot to say. Most importantly, calling myself out,” Green said. “You can’t go into a Game 7 expecting guys to rally off the game we had before and not address it. You can’t be a leader and not be accountable.

“You call other guys out when your s*** stinks, you better say when yours does too.”

He grabbed six rebounds but kept the Rockets away from second chances, allowing the smallest guard on the court to lead the team in rebounding, as Curry had 10.

Curry had everything in his bag early but the shot, so he facilitated, created space for everyone else and did the little things — still being able to claim wizardry over this Rockets franchise despite only scoring 22 points, far off his career Game 7 average of 32.6.

“If I tried to play hero ball too early and the shots didn’t fall, it could kill our whole rhythm,” Curry said.

His goal was one turnover, which he held true to until one minute remained and his team was well on the way to advancing.

“I missed a couple, maybe two easy ones in the first half and you start thinking about your shot,” Curry said. “But you look at the score.”

The Warriors led because the Rockets couldn’t muster any offense and because Buddy Hield took advantage of every nook in the Rockets’ perimeter defense to knock down 9-of-11 triples — four in the second quarter, when the Warriors took control, and three in the fourth, when they pulled away.

Jimmy Butler joined Green in battling the bigs on the boards, getting to loose balls and battling, and if you didn’t know any better, you’d think he’d been around for all these championships, all these runs, because he fit right in.

Butler’s corner 3 with 1:45 left in the third quelled a Rockets run, putting the Warriors back up six. He finished with 20 points, eight rebounds and seven assists. Those small plays and big ones are the reason he’s in a Warriors uniform.

“I wasn’t being who I was in a sense of pumping confidence into my guys,” Butler said. “That’s a part of my leadership I’ve picked up through the years. And I wasn’t doing that the first six games.”

The vets seemed to account for all of the critical production, as only Kevon Looney scored off the bench. Game 7’s are for the vets, and although the Rockets have a couple of admirable ones, it’s different staring across the way and seeing Curry, Green and Butler.

“That’s the common theme, the common denominator in all these guys. It’s their competitive force and how much they love to play, compete, win, in the process of going through it,” Kerr said. “The fact these guys continue to put themselves on the line, year after year after year, it just blows me away.”

So much of this playoff marathon comes down to concentration. Teams will play every other day, in between switching venues, along with all of the emotional and physical exhaustion that’s baked into each playoff possession.

It’s hard to pinpoint, but Kerr could tell his team was actually ready for this test — you can’t call it a moment because the Warriors have been in too many, but it was certainly a test of resolve. He kept saying “gameplan discipline.”

When you look at Curry’s face, there’s the hint of the babyface charm that was introduced to the world so many years ago, but we all know he desires to cut out every ounce of hope in a building.

We didn’t know that 11 years ago, during his first Game 7. That was a real babyface, barely any facial hair and no hint of the jewelry that covers his hands today.

And even he didn’t know exactly how much concentration was necessary when the unproven but talented Warriors were going against the Chris Paul-Blake Griffin-Doc Rivers Los Angeles Clippers in a first-round classic that was a glimpse into what we would see for the next decade.

“We were up at the half and feeling good about ourselves,” said Curry of that game, when the Warriors led by eight before losing by five. “And we kind of got walked down by physical, hard-nosed basketball. That was the nature of that whole series. Very similar to this one.

“A talent, skill, something that either comes naturally or you go through reps and figure it out, how you can manage a game mentally, emotionally and physically.”

He pointed to the four-point play the Warriors gave up on the opening possession in the fourth quarter of game 6 as evidence they didn’t have concentration as a skill that evening.

But Curry had it all Sunday, even as he was hounded by Amen Thompson, even when Dillon Brooks went out of his way to whack Curry’s injured thumb on his shooting hand. By the time Curry finally found daylight, he launched a triple from 30 feet, because Steven Adams forgot the rule. You can’t give Curry a sliver of daylight, not even from that distance, not even with 35 seconds left in the first half.

Curry raised his hands to the sky as if to say, “Finally.” And then it was on.

It’s onto Minnesota, where the hungry and not as naive Timberwolves await. Another challenge for the vets, another opportunity to yell through opposing hallways, another opportunity to quiet loud buildings.

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